Search form

Search

For Immediate Release

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Contact:

With 2 million members, SEIU is the fastest-growing union in
North America. Focused on uniting workers in three sectors to improve
their lives and the services they provide, SEIU is the largest health
care union, including hospitals, nursing homes, and home care; the
largest property services union, including building cleaning and
security; and the second largest public employee union.

CNA/NNOC is the nation's largest organization of direct care RNs with 85,000 members in all 50 states.

SEIU, CNA/NNOC Announce Major Accord

Expected to Spur Campaign for Employee Free Choice Act, Spark Major Drive for Healthcare Union Organizing, and Boost RN Standards and Power for Healthcare Workers

OAKLAND, CA/WASHINGTON DC - In a dramatic agreement likely to accelerate the drive to pass the
Employee Free Choice Act and rapidly promote unionization in the
healthcare sector, the Service Employees International Union and the
California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee
today announced the signing of a transformative cooperation agreement.

Under the pact SEIU and CNA/NNOC, the largest unions in the nation
representing healthcare workers and registered nurses, respectively,
will work together to bring union representation to all non-union RNs
and other healthcare employees and step up efforts to enact Employee
Free Choice.

Increased union representation in healthcare, say the unions, would
play a huge role in strengthening the ability of nurses and other
employees to fight for improved patient care standards, promote
economic recovery through improved economic standards, and sharply
assist efforts to enact genuine healthcare reform nationally and in
state capitols.

Concurrently, SEIU and CNA/NNOC jointly endorsed measures to allow
states to adopt single-payer, or an expanded and updated Medicare for
all, as a comprehensive, cost effective healthcare reform.

"The marks the beginning of a new future for nurses and other
healthcare workers and their patients throughout this nation," said
Andy Stern, president of SEIU, the nation's largest healthcare union. "
We are lining up to make sweeping changes to this country's broken
healthcare system, and as we wait for the starting gun it is imperative
that we put the past behind us and move forward by putting all
healthcare workers in the strongest possible position to define reform,
move legislation and make the new healthcare system operational. Is
this accord surprising? Perhaps, but those who recognize our shared
value of making sure registered nurses and other healthcare workers
have not only a say but a critical role in helping reshape a failed
system into something that actually helps people know that this is the
right step to help us meet the challenge and the call of this moment."

"This is an exciting new day for nurses and patients across the
nation," said CNA/NNOC Executive Director Rose Ann DeMoro. "This
agreement provides a huge spark for the emergence of a more powerful,
unified national movement that is needed to more effectively challenge
healthcare industry layoffs and attacks on RN economic and professional
standards and patient care conditions. It will also strengthen the
ability of all direct care RNs to fight for real healthcare reform and
advocate for improved patient care conditions and stronger patient
safety legislation from coast to coast."

Today's agreement comes just three weeks after the announcement that
CNA/NNOC, with 85,000 current members, will be uniting with the United
American Nurses and the Massachusetts Nurses Union to form the largest
RN union ever in the U.S. with 150,000 members. Steps to complete that
unification are continuing.

Now, augmented by the joint campaigns with SEIU and its 2 million
members, the creation of a much larger, stronger, national nurses union
and RN movement, with sweeping implications for improving RN standards
and patient care protections, is greatly hastened, said CNA/NNOC and
SEIU today.

Among key elements of the pact:

The two unions will work together to organize non-union
hospital workers throughout the country, with CNA/NNOC as the leading
voice for RNs, and SEIU as the leading voice for all other hospital
workers.

The unions will launch an intensive national organizing campaign with an initial focus on the nation's largest hospital systems.

In addition to organizing, SEIU and CNA/NNOC will coordinate on a
broad range of other issues from bargaining with common employers to
the campaign to enact the Employee Free Choice Act.

Both parties will refrain from "raiding," seeking to displace the
existing members of the other's organization, or from interference in
the other's internal affairs.

The two unions will create a new joint RN organization in Florida
to represent current and future RNs of both unions. In all other
states, SEIU will continue to represent their current RN members in
collective bargaining.

###

This is the world we live in. This is the world we cover.

Because of people like you, another world is possible. There are many battles to be won, but we will battle them together—all of us. Common Dreams is not your normal news site. We don't survive on clicks. We don't want advertising dollars. We want the world to be a better place. But we can't do it alone. It doesn't work that way. We need you. If you can help today—because every gift of every size matters—please do. Without Your Support We Simply Don't Exist.

Further

Last week, the "world's most moral army" bombed and leveled Gaza's much-loved al-Meshal Theater and Cultural Center, rare home to hundreds of artists, dancers and writers and vital symbol of Palestinian identity, to "make residents feel the price of escalation." The next day, the Palestinian band al-Anqaa (or Phoenix) returned in defiance to play for their beleaguered neighbors, because "art is, too, a form of resistance."

Common Dreams brings you the news that matters.

Sign up for Newsletter

Connect With Us

Support Our Spring Fundraising Drive

Can We Count on Your Help Today?

Common Dreams is a small nonprofit with a big mission. Every day of the week, we publish the most important breaking news & views for the progressive community. To remain an independent news source, we do not advertise, sell subscriptions or accept corporate contributions. Instead, we rely on readers like you, to provide the "people power" that fuels our work. Please help keep Common Dreams alive by making a contribution to our fundraising drive. Thank you. - Craig Brown, Co-founder